Sometime back in March I saw the football World Cup advertised on a pub chalkboard. Later that week, I had the idea that the British Museum was ideally placed to join in this global tournament – few other places can boast objects from all 32 countries taking part.

The plan was to tweet images of a pair of objects for each match, one from each of the countries represented. This way we could showcase the Museum’s collection, but also the art and culture of those countries. I soon realised my own knowledge of the cultures of countries such as Algeria, Honduras and Costa Rica was limited at best. With the help of Steff Maxwell, our Marketing Assistant, we spoke to various curators across the Museum, and began to search the collection database. The scale of what we had taken on soon became clear – it would involve 64 matches and 128 objects, some from countries where the collection is not as well represented as others.

Ultimately, we hope that it has engaged people with the collection – perhaps introducing some to its breadth and depth for the first time. Some of the objects have been iconic, such as Dürer’s Rhinoceros for Germany and Leonardo da Vinci’s bust of a warrior for Italy. Some of the objects have been much less well known – a stone figure from Costa Rica, a beautiful jar from South Korea, or a drinking cup from Argentina. But really the tournament has shown what’s best about the Museum – telling new and surprising stories, sometimes in unexpected places. It’s been fun to do, and hopefully fun to follow.

The British Museum is perhaps unique in being able to tell the human story through objects. In the recent Annual Review, the Chairman of the Trustees set out his vision to make the British Museum ‘the digital museum of the world’. Social media and the availability of the collection online means that we have a fantastic opportunity to engage people with the collection all over the world – people who may never be able to come to London to see things in the flesh. To use a football cliché, at the end of the day, perhaps this is what social media is made for.